Rigor Mortis
by alchemy dream
Summary: Anakin dreams of death, of something deeper than death.


**Rigor Mortis:Alchemy Dream**

**A/N: **Rated for disturbingness.You have been warned. Reviews are love.

**Warnings: **I've lost my mind. The flu and Anakin's inherent irrationality are my excuses.

**Summary:** Anakin dreams of death. Of stillness.

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There was cessation.

He knew the sound of the glowing blade piercing his throat, of the silencing of his beautiful voice in a second's time. He knew the haunting view, the still glowing hole that bloodlessly exposed the internal jugular vein, the carotid artery, the layers of pink neck muscle singed at the edges from his betrayal.

He tried to go back to his normal life. He tried not to shut the other man out. He tried to enjoy the haven of lovemaking with him, but could never see past the accusatory eyes of a corpse, and upon throwing the man off of him in fear and disgust, could never give him a reason why. He even tried sleeping to escape.

But sleep brought dreams

Tears carved paths down his face as he studied Obi-Wan's breathing patterns in the darkness, the light, peaceful rise and fall of his chest, the gentle snoring sound from between his thin lips. A soft ethereal glow crept in like a mist on that early, early winter morning, covering their bodies in selective places.

Anakin shifted in the bed to press his nose into the crook of Obi-Wan's neck, allowing his tears to slowly seep into the older man's skin. He silenced himself before a loud sob could escape his trembling lips, kissing his lover's freckled body.

Reaching out to trail his hand over Obi-Wan's strong shoulder, he smiled a little. Anakin loved Obi-Wan's freckles, how they fell haphazardly over his sun-darkened face and neck and shoulders. As if summoned, Obi-Wan's greyish eyes cracked open, lashes spilling in subconscious blinks over his cheeks.

"Mmm...Anakin? Are you still awake?" he asked, sleep cracking his voice. He wrapped his arm tighter around Anakin's waist, his other hand snaking around to tousle the younger man's dark, sandy hair. Anakin buried himself deeper into the embrace, doing his best to stifle his tears. They had gone this long without explanation, and now was certainly not the time.

Because Anakin wouldn't let Obi-Wan die. Not like his mother had. He wouldn't be too late.

"I was just about to fall back asleep. Don't let it worry you, Obi," he said, using the Force to gently coax Obi-Wan back to sleep. He reached up to twine his fingers in his coppery hair, praying that the closeness would stop the dreams.

His mother had told him that dreams were the mind's way of keeping people from being lonely in sleep, and that was the explanation for his nightly visions of friends, his mom. Slowly, the dreams shifted. It was a gradual change, spanning months. He had gone for years after his mother's death, dreamless and healing, until his mind saw fit to eradicate Obi-Wan.

Snuggling deeper into that familiar warmth, Anakin felt lost. His dreams had always guided his reality. His history of precognitive thought had long been accurate, predicting his rescue from slavery, prompting his desire to be a Jedi, and foreseeing the fall of Shmi Skywalker. If destiny was unstoppable, if his dreams were divination of an inescapable reality, what could be done differently, this time?

Especially now that it was_ himself_ that he'd have to stop?

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Sleep slowly, unwillingly claimed him. He drifted down into those dark places, the ones he didn't want to visit. Slowly he sank, and landed. It was only the two of them, standing together in the barren Council chamber. In its dreamlike manifestation, it became a landscape of amorphous moving shapes and sounds, dawn filtering in through the dusty windows.

From the halls came the cries of the younglings, most of them silenced quickly as their murderers severed their throats. One young boy crawled from down the hall, grasping for Anakin's aid. He did his best to push the blood that trickled from the top of his head away from his wet eyes, succeeding only in plastering his blonde hair to his forehead.

"Mastuhh...please...I," and then he screamed, a blaster bolt piercing his chest.

He couldn't have been six years old.

"Nothing too fancy, Cody," he said, his voice feeling strangely alien to him. He turned to Obi-Wan, his lover's face contorted in disbelief at the blinking eyes, the twitching lips of the child as he sank into death. Obi-Wan rushed over to him as his fingers clutched and released on the floor, reaching for something that no longer existed in this realm. He touched the contracting fingers, feeling in vain for a pulse in the still wrist.

"He's gone, Obi-Wan. It's just muscle contractions." Obi-Wan turned, his eyes shaky and wide, searching Anakin. Anakin smiled, and approached Obi-Wan.

"I've researched death, Obi-Wan. I've seen too much of it not to know how it works. First the blood will pool to the underside of the body. Then his eyes will fix towards the light...towards the sun," Anakin said, staring out into the fiery, indifferent sunrise.

"Anakin! We have to search the temple! There might be survivors!" Obi-Wan screamed, trying to grab Anakin's arm. Anakin resisted his touch.

"Then the rigor mortis will set in. Don't worry...it will go away within, oh...a _day._ His body will cool about two degrees per hour." Obi-Wan stopped trying to tug Anakin closer and let go of his hand, his face twisting in confusion.

"Anakin...what?" he said, stepping back towards the wall as Anakin drew his lightsaber. His eyes opened wide in fear as the blue blade ignited, the blade he had trained him to use. The two engaged in a slow dance, that of a predator and its prey. Anakin took advantage of Obi-Wan's shock and fear, his lack of defense, and pulled the man closer, planting a bitter kiss on his dry lips, whispering unknown words into his mouth, before impaling his Master with the weapon.

It was all slow motion. Obi-Wan's eyes stared at him in shock, instant, immediate death as he was penetrated first through the trachea (Anakin couldn't bear his screams) and then his heart (to ease the pain). He simply watched, amidst the rape of the Jedi Temple, as Obi-Wan lay staring, his pupils dilated and fixed on the rising sun, mouth opening and closing.

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He woke up screaming.

"Obi-Wan! Obi...!" he cried, tears finding their way back down his face as he clutched at Obi-Wan tighter. Startled into consciousness, the older man twined his leg around Anakin's shaking body, pulling him closer and running his fingers over Anakin's spine.

"Anakin! What's wrong?" he cooed gently. Anakin only pushed Obi-Wan away, a wild look in his eyes, followed by a desperate whimper.

"No! Don't touch me." He jumped up from the bed, nearly tripping himself with his long sleep pants. Obi-Wan only looked on with confusion, hurt, question. For the first time in a while, Anakin resembled the frightened young boy he'd met nearly ten years ago on that intergalactic void in the Outer Rim. He could see past the larger frame to the impossibly large blue eyes that he had learned to adore. He reached for the younger man a second time, only to watch Anakin back further away.

"No. I won't watch you die," Anakin smiled, a mad, bright look in his eyes. "I won't, Obi-Wan."

He ran.

He ran through the halls, his footfalls echoing through the reception area, towards the elevator. Close behind, he could hear the frenetic steps of Obi-Wan chasing him down through the corridors like a heat-seeking missile. He caught a glimpse of the man as the elevator doors shut, in his cotton shorts, panting and confused.

Anakin smiled as he rose above the city, the dawn only just beginning to break among the gaps between the buildings. Sunrise was always so beautiful, so warm. It was all of the damned buildings, the tons of metal that absolutely covered the ecumenopolis, proving to be a giant reflector for the sun. Anakin had always loved it. It made him feel warm, although it was always so cold. He savoured the feeling of the platform moving, the warm air inside the elevator chamber.

Stop.

He climbed out of the elevator onto the landing, the seemingly endless panorama that was Coruscant splayed before his eyes. His breath fogged out in front of him in little puffs.

"This planet is fucking beautiful," he uttered, sensing Obi-Wan close behind him. He could feel him running up the emergency stairs, the turmoil in his heart. He turned just in time to see the man practically fall from the doorway.

"What in the _blazes_ are you doing, Anakin?" Obi-Wan panted, moving towards his former apprentice, and stopping when Anakin took three steps towards the infinite fall he was willing to take.

"I won't let you go, Obi-Wan."

"What are you _talking_ about, Anakin? Please! Talk to me!"

"I have these nightmares, Obi-Wan. Like the ones about my mother. Except it's...you," Anakin said, shaking. Obi-Wan shrugged, trying to find relevance.

"Goddammit, Obi-Wan! I'll kill you! Just like I killed her!" he screamed, turning to run towards the horizon.

In a moment, there was selfishness, love, a bright spot of warmth in a galaxy of pain and uncertainty.

There were arms that fought gravity, that fought death. There was anger towards Anakin, the outrageousness of a human being thinking _only_, terminally of _himself_. There was an absolutely trivial compilation of moments, that in the greater scheme of things meant everything and nothing all at once.

As Obi-Wan caught him, gripping Anakin's arm as he nearly slid over the edge, he couldn't imagine the consummate emptiness of a person who could snuff out their own life on the basis of what might or _might not have been_ a premonition.

Obi-Wan used every fiber of strength to call Anakin out of that dark place, a place deeper than death. There was existence and there was meaning. There was forgiveness without understanding. He wrapped his hands, his fingers, his legs and toes around Anakin, refusing to participate in his madness, to rethink his thoughts, retrace his steps. None of it mattered. Nothing. There were tears and throaty apologies.

"Anakin...I won't leave you," Obi-Wan said into his scalp, "Everything will be fine. We'll go on a vacation, anything. Tell me what I can do," he said, smiling to calm Anakin. Everything he did was for Anakin.

Anakin stopped shaking a little, longing for the slow, erotic burn of anticipation, the pastoral languor of love made in the filtered sunlight of a summer afternoon. Anything to distract him from the dreams that would not leave him until its events had transpired. But until then, Anakin would be torn between the world of pain and loss his dreams predicted and his waking reality, where Obi-Wan would be there to soothe the burning tears, the irrational impulses. His breath hitched as Obi-Wan ceased running his fingers along his back, and looked up into his lover's eyes.

"Don't stop. Please, Obi-Wan, don't ever stop moving," he whispered, unable to imagine his unseeing eyes, his body vacant of a pulse. In the end, it all came down to a refusal to accept death, another loss, a greater fear that haunted him like a clock ticking on the wall.

Stillness.


End file.
